A Taste of Barcelona:Key Highlights from Ericsson at the Mobile World Congress 2012

The Networked Society is Ericsson's vision of everyone and anything that can benefit from being connected will be connected. We already see this happening in a big way today, from deploying connected remote health monitoring devices, to providing low-cost cloud-based computing; from tracking freight vessels and containers in the high seas, to empowering the unbanked population with mobile payments with their phones. This vision of shaping the Networked Society drives our portfolio and our daily activities within Ericsson, and naturally, this is embedded within our messages at the Mobile World Congress 2012.

We believe that the Networked Society is the next phase of our societal development. Just like how the steam combustion engine paved the way for the industrial revolution, three key ingredients are paving the way for the Networked Society - mobility, broadband and the cloud. These three enablers will transform the way we live, the way society interacts, and the way business is conducted; and we see that the world is demanding and consuming various aspects of these at an amazing pace.(From L to right) Steven Tai (Head of Strategy & Marketing, Ericsson Malaysia & Sri Lanka), Janne Laitala (President of Ericsson Malaysia & Sri Lanka) and Dr Timothy Senathirajah (Technology Strategy Director, Strategic Program Practice, Ericsson South East Asia & Oceania).

Mobile communications is now ubiquitous with six billion connections. Broadband subscribers have exceeded the one billion mark and are consuming more than double the bandwidth every year. Cloud services and applications are being developed and adopted faster than we ever imagined. However, we still have a long way to go. For the Networked Society vision to be achieved, we need to ensure that all three key elements - mobility, broadband and the cloud are truly ubiquitous; that is, available, affordable and accessible.

In Malaysia, we shared our vision with the Malaysian government. We were an active member of the PEMANDU Economic Transformation Programme’s Communications, Content & Infrastructure National Key Economic Area (CCI NKEA) lab, and even appointed as a lab leader. The members of the lab agreed with our vision, and it shaped the ten Entry Point Projects (EPP) of the CCI NKEA. From the Connecting 1Malaysia EPP to ensure all Malaysians are connected to each other and the various commercial and government services in the nation, to the Smart Network EPP, ensuring that communication and broadband services are truly accessible and affordable. Today, we see many initiatives driven by PEMANDU, the government and the private sector in making those EPPs a reality such as the 1Malaysia Bestari Net project for the E-Learning EPP to ensure a sustainable and comprehensive approach to Smart Schools, to the incorporation of Konsortium Rangkaian Serantau for the Regional Networks EPP to reduce the cost of IP transit.

Yet, we still have much to achieve.

At the Mobile World Congress 2012, Ericsson made many announcements, discussed various solutions, and demonstrated many proof points to achieve the Networked Society vision. We continued our dialogue with industry members around the three main themes - mobility, broadband and the cloud; and on how we can make these elements truly ubiquitous. For instance, we announced our involvement, participation and commitment to the OpenStack Forum, to ensure we have a truly open but yet interoperable approach to developing cloud infrastructure, applications and content. We also announced the launch of Mobile Cloud Accelerator and its deployment with Telkomsel of Indonesia, in cooperation with Akamai Technologies, to ensure the instantaneous delivery of time-critical content. We demonstrated our Capacitive Coupling, our latest development in using the human body to connect devices and transfer data. We also demonstrated end-to-end live data calls with speeds of 150 megabits per second over LTE Advanced, ensuring greater capacity for the future given the scarcity of spectrum; and many more.

We grouped our discussion points around the four key pain points of the industry - customer experience, the cloud, business innovation, and business efficiencies. This created deep discussions, share insights and co-create solutions to current and future issues and problems that the industry is facing. We talked about smarter network solutions required to deliver better customer experience in the Networked Society, and how to ensure the sustainability of the industry; how telecommunication service providers can enable more efficient and effective cloud services; how to reinvent mobile broadband and offer new and relevant services to consumers and enterprises.

Weeks after the Mobile World Congress 2012, we have been taking these same discussions with a greater audience, outside the 67,000 visitors that attended. With our Taste of Barcelona initiatives, we have been sharing these discussions with customers, industry partners, government agencies and the media. We strive to reach and engage an even larger audience with our Technology for Good social media pages to collaborate in shaping the Networked Society. We hope you will visit our sites as well, and join us in making the Networked Society a reality.